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A CITY WHICH HATH FOUNDATIONS. 



A SERMON 



PREACHED OX OCCASION OF THE 



FIFTIETH AMIVKRSARY 



OK THE ORGANIZATION" 



OF THP] FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH 



IN MONTPELIER, VERMONT 



JviY 25 ; 1358 




B y W--'. H . LORD, Pastor 



MONTPELIER: 

E..P. WALTON, PRINTER 

1858. 



SERMON 



Hbb. xi., 10. A CITY WHICH HATH FOUNDATIONS. 

In one of the noblest Psalms which the King of Israel struck from 
his inspired harp, there is a sublime apostrophe to the church at 
Jerusalem. In the opening strain he sings, The Lord loveth the 
gates of Zion. His foundation is in the holy mountains. Glori- 
ous things are spoken of thee, O city of Crod. And then he 
closes the hymn with a poetic declaration of the high honor 
which it brings to one to have been connected with its services, 
and to have been a resident of this glorious symbolic city. The 
Lord shall count when he ivriteth up the people, that this and 
that man ivas horn in her. 

The text I have selected is the apostle's expression of the same 
idea. It is descriptive of the earthly church. It is also pro- 
phetic of that immortal and equal society, the commonwealth of 
justified spirits, gathered by the Redeemer out of every kindred 
and nation, [t is a type and symbol of that perfect state and 
city, ' whose citizenship is heavenly, whose charter is the infi- 
nite grace, whose title and right of freedom are faith in the 
Son of God;' whose eternal builder and protector, whose wall 
of fire and whose column of cloud, by day and by night, is the 
living God. 

And while it is peculiarly true el" the church in general ; the 
church universal, visible and invisible, militant and triumphant : 
that it is a city which hath foundations, and to be a resident in 
it is the chief dignity and honor allotted to mortal mail : to share 



its promises and hopes and fortunes, his noblest blessedness : it 
may also be said of any particular church of Christ that it is a 
city which hath foundations, and so long as it rests upon its du- 
rable and strong rock, the gates of hell cannot prevail against it ; 
go long as it is built on Christ, and built up in him, there is no 
local church of the Eedeemer of which glorious things shall not 
continue to be spoken. 

We believe this church to be founded upon this eternal Rock. 
For a half-century it has proved the excellence and -virtue of 
Him upon whom it has been built. It has witnessed days of re- 
buke and wandering and trial, but it has not left the corner stone. 
It has been assailed by foes within and without, but it is stron- 
ger to-day than ever. It has seen an end of theories and specu 
lations and measures and institutions, and things that have aimed 
to supercede or weaken or destroy it. It has survived all antag- 
onisms of men, all the oppositions of nature that have been 
brought to bear upon it, and still it stands to-day upon the same 
living foundation upon which it was built fifty years ago ; its 
numbers twenty-folded ; its reasons for confidence in Christ and 
God multiplied ; its faith and love as strong and clear as when 
they found their first organized expression. 

A city which hath foundations — not commercial, not industri- 
al, but moral, spiritual— that is the beautiful symbol of a chris- 
tian church. And why may we not borrow the sublime imagery 
of the apostle, in which he paints the glory of the universal tri- 
umphant church, and use it to describe our own church, grown 
^stronger, with the flight of years, and now numbering almost as 
many within the palace walls of heaven, as there are left on 
earth to fight the long, animating battle, for the same fadeless 
crown. The church lives, not more in its present, than in its 
absent and glorified members ; and while it enrolls on its cata- 
logue the names of those who now stand before the sapphire- 
throne, as well as of those who are struggling onward and up- 
ward, we may well say that our foundation is in the holy moun- 



tains, or sing as did the Psalmist, of Jerusalem, Glorious things 
are spoken of thee, O city of our God! 

A previous announcement of my subject makes no explanation 
or apology necessary for the direction which my discourse will 
take to-day. As you are well aware, the fiftieth anniversary of 
the organization of this church occurred on the 20th day of the 
present month. This is the first semi-centennial Sunday of 
its organized existence. It is well to take note of such cycles 
of time ; to compare our present and former condition , to con- 
sult the record of providences and facts, to see how the hand of 
the Good Shepherd lias led on his flock ; to learn what rea- 
sons we have for humility and what for praise ; what there is to 
dishearten and what to encourage, and to glean from the irrevo- 
cable Past, principles and motives to guide and cheer our 
hearts in the available Future. It was the usage of the Jewish 
church to keep every fiftieth year as a Jubilee, and hold high 
public festivities, and commence anew the whole course of social 
and religious life. Like the Olympiad of the Greeks and the 
Lustra of the Romans, the Jubilee of Israel was designed as a 
way mark in the history of the nation. On those semi-centennial 
periods, the people were wont to worship with peculiar and 
splendid services, and again reverting to the first principles of 
their social and religious organized life, to begin their work 
afresh with the results of past experience gathered up into les- 
sons for future conduct and guidance. And I know of no reason 
why a christian church may not also have its recurring jubilees, 
and celebrate them, if not with equal magnificence, yet in a 
manner appropriate to the simple and divine beauty of its pecu- 
liar mission and services. 

Of necessity my discourse will be desultory, 'pursuing rather 
a historical than a logical sequence, and running along with 
such statements of facts, and with such reflections, as are sug- 
gested in the history of the church. It will be like tracing a 
stream from its fountain head, along the course of its winding 



channel, now small and rapid, now over rocks, now through 
deep forests, now spreading itself out through rich and fertile 
meadows. There are two histories to any church — the external 
one of names, and events, and records, and statistics ; and the in- 
ternal one of thoughts, purposes, feelings, passions and principles. 
The one is found in books, and the other in minds and hearts 
and lives. The one is the dry channel, the bed of the stream, 
the geographical chart of its course ; the other is the running 
water, with its murmuring music, or its swollen freshets, or its 
pouring torrent, coursing along banks set with beauty and foliage, 
and through a scenery glowing with light and variety. The 
external history is to be read, studied, compared, analyzed ; 
the internal history is to be inferred and imagined. We would 
hardly care to read the former unless urged by some ulterior 
motive ; but recently I heard a man say, that he would like to 
live over the latter. It would take him a day to read the one. 
it would take him fifty years to read the other. The first is a 
record of votes, of actions, of general results; the second is a 
long passage of toil, of fear, of hope, of faith, of love glowing, 
and love dimmed in the rage of controversy ; of pains and afflic- 
tions, of body aches and heart aches ; of temptations met. 
yielded to or overcome ; of triumphs and songs of victory. 

And it is to be regretted that even the records of this exter- 
nal history are not full ; that they are always defective and un- 
satisfactory ; not even perfect as a record of births, and deaths 
and baptisms. Still one cannot read them, imperfect as they 
are, without having the whole internal history of the church 
brought vividly to his mind. Even the list of deaths is eloquent, 
and opens a half-century of sorrows and trials ; of parents 
mourning for children, and sons and daughters weeping over the 
ashes of fathers and mothers ; and brothers and sisters, lifting their 
voices in a common grief. Nor is the catalogue of baptisms less 
touching and telling. In the old academy, in the old State 
House, in this church, on how many heads, now frosted with the 



snows of time, now sprinkled with the gray of autumn, have been 
poured the consecrating waters, with the uttered invocation " to 
Father, Son and Holy Ghost." With what pride and love, with 
what hope and prayers, have parental hearts been surcharged 
as they have, on the altar of this church, dedicated their children, 
and vowed them to Christ and his church, — and how now do they 
rejoice among the angels, at the fulfilled covenant, or wait and 
intercede for those who, twenty, forty, fifty years ago, they gave 
in faith/ to the God of the Heavens and the earth. 

Nor is the list of admissions in the church without a voice. — 

When God makes up his last account 

Of nations in his holy mount, 

It -will be an honor to appear 

As one new born and nourished there. 

What spiritual experiences, what processes of conviction and 
sorrow, at the discovery* of sin, have been gone through, — what 
doubts have been met and vanquished, what fears have been 
raised and quelled, what scruples and hesitations and distrusts, 
before even a single name of all that ample record has been en- 
tered upon the sacred roll. And how each name on that cata- 
logue of many pages, speaks of the grace and goodness of God, 
through our Lord Jesus Christ, and testifies to the atoning life 
and death of the Son of the Highest, — and how they bring their 
separate and their united tributes unto the Savior of men, and 
join forever in a silent song of praise " unto Him who hath loved 
us and washed us from our sins in his own blood.'' A noble com- 
pany of near a thousand witnesses, stand upon that record, and 
they all bring their praise and thanksgiving up through the heart 
broken miser ere of their penitence, to him that sitteth upon the 
Throne and to the Lamb, No matter what failures are there 
registered, the testimony of every person enrolled on the book:; 
of the church, is recorded for Christ, and it is the noblest associ- 
ation in which a man's name can be written ; an association ol 
intelligent, accountable and immortal beings, all recognizing 



8 



their individual responsibilities to God; all avowing- their su- 
premest duty, their sublimest privilege— when they " avouch the 
great Jehovah, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, to be the object of 
their supreme love, and their everlasting obedience." 

What worldly institution, founded upon mere temporal expedi- 
encies or ends, has such a retrospect, and such a future ? The 
walls and systems of all temporary policies, of all earthly organ- 
izations, shall fall down, not one stone left upon another, but here 
is a city that hath foundations. All true members in it are mem- 
bers of an eternal fellowship — citizens of a celestial state. They 
have written their names on the highest record, on which it is 
given man to write, and the ages of eternity will not efface the 
inscription. The tablet of the church is God's Book of Life. — 
The world may give us its associations and assume their supe- 
riority to the church, but the record of the latter outlasts the 
former, just as Eternity outlasts Time. 

It would seem, then, that just in the proportion the church 
prospers among a people, and its moral and spiritual ideas are 
taught and received, does a State, or city, or town, become hon- 
ored and great. It was the boast of the apostle Paul, when ar- 
rested at Jerusalem, and led off to prison by a rude soldiery, 
charged by false accusers, that he was not an Egyptian, the 
vile ringleader of a vile mob, but a veritable Hebrew of Tarsus, 
a city of Cilicia, " a citizen of no mean city," and, therefore, en- 
titled to his freedom and to an audience of the people. The crowd 
respected his plea of defense, and standing on the castle steps 
he preached the sublime doctrine of his ministry. And yet this 
Cilician city was not so large as this. It stood upon the banks 
of a river no broader nor deeper than that which flows through 
our village. It was built almost in a day, and there was no ma- 
terial or commercial grandeur about it to command the homage 
of its apostolic Son, or to get for him the hearing and applause 
of the crowd. Whatever celebrity it had was derived from the 
superiority of its ideas, from the thoughts that had it for their 



9 



birthplace, "from the religious culture of which it was the famed 
fountain head." It was its wisdom and its religion, that arrest- 
ed the violence of the Jewish persecutor ; encircled as with de- 
fensive armor, the dignity and freedom of the apostle, and raised 
it to the honor of being no mean city. 

And so always the true foundations of a city, those winch 
most resemble it to its heavenly pattern, are not its extent, it* 
wealth, its luxury, its ambitious houses, its commeice and its 
sports; but they are the* spirit and temper of the people, the 
ideas that form, direct and regulate, the reverence for religious 
things, the strict consecration of divine institutions and ordinan- 
ces. They are in the thoroughness and discipline of education, 
in the abundance of charity, the purity of manners, the sincerity 
of social life, the moral and Christian virtues that grace woman- 
hood and adorn manhood. It is not houses, and shops, and fac- 
tories, and public buildings, that make a noble community — but. 
plant your foundations deep and broad in the moral, in the re- 
ligious natures of men ; train and develop their rational and their 
immortal powers : and then shall you " be citizens of no mean 
city." It is men — women — with true ideas of God and Christ, 
and with profound reverence for divine institutions, and for all 
that elevates and blesses the minds, hearts and souls of a State, 
that are its genuine, deepest, best foundations. 

This principle, so apparent in its statement, practically so little 
thought of, was recognized by the early settlers of this communi- 
ty. This village had been settled about ten years, and was al- 
ready collecting a considerable population, when the principle be- 
gan to act as a distinct motive, upon the minds of its residents. 
They came to the conclusion that the correctives of religious in- 
fluence, and restraint, and ideas, were essential to elevate the 
character of the community. Acted upon by the motive of im- 
mediate utility, and also moved by those wants and necessities of 
the spiritual nature, which are always seeking satisfaction though 
often finding none, it was voted, January 1(5, 1800, at a legally 



10 



warned meeting of the town, to choose a committee of three per- 
sons to employ a teacher of religion, to be compensated out of the 
town treasury. The idea of what were the true foundations of a 
civilized community then first found its expression in this place. 
In 1800, the town voted that religion was the essential thing to 
the welfare and prosperity of the place. Men must have the 
ideas and the principles of religious responsibility, of accounta- 
bility to God, or there is no protection to the individual charac- 
ter, and no security to the public welfare. Divine ideas of duty, 
of privilege, of truth, of immortality, must be taught and held if 
we would fashion an earthly community according to our inbred 
and instinctive conception of what a community ought to be. A 
lively sense of religious responsibility must run into all our ac- 
tions, whether personal or social. It is the obligation of citizen- 
ship to shape our actual society and its institutions, by the models 
of the Divine Word. That obligation was recognized in the 
vote to which I have alluded. 

Before this time, as occasion had required, the inhabitants 
availed themselves of the services of the first minister in the town 
of Berlin. He preached at funerals, and in one instance on Sun- 
day, in a house in the village. That minister, settled in the town 
of Berlin sixty years ago last January, a man of education, of 
sensibility and native power, still lives ; and but three weeks 
ago he spoke with a vigor not abated by three score years of ser- 
vice for his Master, in our vestry. And it was with a new inter- 
est that I looked upon his venerable form and features, when I 
remembered that his voice was the first that proclaimed Christ 
crucified in the houses of this village. 

Upon the instruction of the town, the committee proceeded to 
employ a religious teacher. And after various unsuccessful at- 
tempts they engaged the Rev. Claek Brown for a year. This 
was before the organization of any society or church, and no rec- 
ords have been kept of his ministry. But from what can be 
gathered from the tradition of the elders, it would seem that Mr. 



11 



Brown was a preacher of considerable talent, but not of very 
sound religious views. He was inclined to the Unitarian theo- 
ries, and however much interest there might have been in his min- 
istrations at first, it soon subsided, and he was left to preach to 
very meagre and unsatisfactory audiences. And whatever might 
be the natural or the Christian patience of the man, it was so 
largely drawn upon as to be exhausted. In six months after he 
was employed, he took occasion on one Sunday to tell some very 
homely truths about the people. He charged upon them their 
faithlessness to religious duties, and painful disregard of public 
worship. He might have said some very earnest and severe 
things, and stirred up the people* to a more just appreciation of 
their miserable sinfulness. At least the effect of the sermon was 
immediate and decided. After service, several of the leading and 
prominent citizens of the town assembled in a neighboring inn, 
and voted to pay Mr. Brown for the remaining six months of his 
engagement, and to release him from any further duties of the 
ministry in this place. A thing both well done and quickly 
done ; for a people often find it easier to pay arrearages and dis- 
miss ministers, than to reform themselves or go regularly to 
church all day. 

After this summary dismission of Mr. Brown, the town appeal's 
to have forgotten in fact, that religion was the only true founda- 
tion of its public security and its individual character. For eight 
years there was no regular religious worship. A writer in one 
of the periodicals of the day says of them, in a communication 
made in 1809 : " They were not disposed to encourage attention to 
religious concerns, and no religious order was observed in the 
place for a number of years. The inhabitants, as might be ex- 
pected, became generally dissipated, and a deplorable state of mor- 
als was the result. The Sabbath was used only for purposes of 
amusement, convivial entertainments, trading and gambling." 01' 
course that is always the result, and worse, too, than that, when 
men knock out the foundations of a Christian citv, and think 



12 



they can live without God. The same causes have produced sim- 
ilar effects a million of times. No city, no town, no community, 
no person, has any solid foundation of virtue or of security, that is 
not formed after the pattern of Christ, and built up in all the or- 
der of his Gospel. 

But the germs of a better life, the elements of a purer society, 
though slumbering and overgrown, were not quite dead. Again in 
1804, a number of inhabitants met, and resolved to take all rea- 
sonable measures to enforce the laws of the State, respecting the 
observance of the Sabbath, and to attend meetings every Sunday 
at the Academy, and when destitute of preaching, to sing and 
read sermons. Twenty-nine persons signed that resolution. — 
The germ was trying to break through its hard shell. The meet- 
ings were held, but even then for nearly three years more, 
prayer was not heard in any family in the village, and very rare- 
ly in their assemblies on the Sabbath. In 180T, a preacher was 
employed who left the same year. 

But such a state of things could not continue in a place that 
was soon to become the political centre of the State. As yet, 
men had been trying to build a superstructure without paying any 
attention to the foundations. They were laying the sills and 
beams of the house on the sand, and while they were practically 
finding out the insecurity of that method, they had not yet got the 
full idea of the essential thing. There remained for the Provi- 
dence which had great designs for the place, to teach its inhabi- 
tants that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain 
that build it ; except the Lord keep the city, the watchman 
waketh in vain. The necessity of the community became stark, 
staring want. It could not be hid from the eyes of any one. — 
The Gospel must come in to establish order, to moderate and 
check passion and vice. The Sunday must be transformed from 
a holiday to a holy day, and the people must think of eternal 
things, if they would have any system, and harmony, and health- 
ful growth in temporal things. The prayerless meeting ; the oc- 



II 



CGasional religions instruction, were insufficient. The few good 
men and women who knew the difficulty and its remedy, were 
powerless, and must wait until the people in general had learned 
wisdom from adversity, from the very reaction of an irreligious 
disorder. The time was at hand for a decided change for the 
better, or h for determining the course of this place to be down- 
ward and destructive. On the 12th day of April, 1808, the ac- 
tion was taken, which, under God, turned the course of events, 
and gave an upward movement to the society. Eighty-three 
men, all the leading and best men of the village, met and organ- 
ized themselves into a religious society by the name of the 
" First Congregational Society in Montpelier ■." As they say in 
their recorded declaration, " Impressed with the importance of 
religious institutions to society in general, and to ourselves as 
men — and taking into consideration the unsettled state of such 
institutions in this part of the country, and the necessity of uni- 
ting in religious opinions and harmony, we do hereby agree to 
form ourselves into a religious society, under the following regu- 
lations/' 

That was a noble declaration, made under a dire necessity. 
It has been kept to this day. It is the organization under which 
we now act. * The first regulation under it, was also a noble 
pledge. " 1. We pledge ourselves to each other, (say these 
eight-three men,) that we will (laying aside trifling differences,) 
according to our abilities, maintain regular meetings in our soci- 
ety and contribute to the support of preaching and to main- 
taining a regular clergyman in this society." Of that number, 
nearly all are passed from earth. Five only remain with us. 
You may be curious to know their names. I shall not hesitate 
to gratify the sentiment. First on the list, and first in order, is 
the name of Geo. Worthington ; next in order, Nathan Jew- 
ett ; next, Joseph Howes ; next, Jonathan Shepherd ; and 
last, Samuel Goss, These tarry with us yet, and may they all 

*See Appendix. 



14 



return late into heaven ; when called from earth, may they all 
enter the city of eternal foundations, "whose builder and maker 
is God." 

April 27 ; this society held its lirst meeting under its organ- 
tion and choose Sam'l Goss a committee for the purpose of 
contracting with a clergyman. May 27, a meeting was warned 
to see if they would employ the Rev. Chester Wright through 
the ensuing year. June 4, voted to employ Mr. Wright for six 
months. At the end of the year, June 24, 1809. the society 
voted to unite with the church in calling Mr. Wright to settle 
in the gospel ministry in this place, and to give him $350 for 
the first year, §375 for the second, $400 together with the use 
of a convenient parsonage, annually, after the second year. so 
long as he shall continue to be their minister. 

This is the first indication on the society's books of a Church. 
And now we go back a little to the time of its organization. 

The organization of the society was the first step toward 
building this community on a true and lasting basis. And still, 
it is apparent to every reflecting mind, that however many wor- 
thy and benevolent objects a society may accomplish, it is rather 
an external institution than an internal. It is an association of 
persons who are externally working to introduce and sustain 
right ideas and principles, rather than a company who recognize 
their obligations to God and Christ, and are trusting in the 
merits of Christ's death, and in the power of His word and spirit 
to be and to live better, holier, purer. It is a moral rather than 
a spiritual institution ; and while not doing away with the neces- 
sity for a church, makes that necessity more evident and impera- 
tive. It was found to be so in the case of this society. The 
church was its first practical result. The human institution was 
necessary as a precursor of the divine — a John the Baptist, her- 
alding the personal Christ. 

If religious institutions are important to society, and to us in- 
dividually, as men, it was natural and necessary, too, for the 



15 



preservation of the society, that a church should spring out of it, 
composed of those who would pledge themselves not simply to 
sustain preaching and the ministry of the divine word, but would 
pledge themselves also, to live according to that word, and to 
carry out its sacred and life-giving precepts in their daily prac- 
tice. It was the legitimate process of an honest, sincere think- 
ing mind, when convinced of the necessity of supporting religion, 
to go straight on to the personal avowal and duties of the gospel . 
The society said it is necessary to public security to sustain the 
doctrines of the New Testament. And what more natural thing 
than that consistent members ol it, looking beyond any im- 
mediate public utility, should each say, It is equally necessary 
for me to adopt its principles as my principles, its God as my 
God, and its revealed redeemer as my Saviour. What more 
natural than that out of a body of near a hundred men, who wit- 
ness to the general utility and necessity of religious institutions, 
some should be found who would wish to go further and declare 
their own personal allegiance to heaven, and bind themselves to 
duties and services that Christianity prescribes, and aim to give 
a practical manifestation of their own confidence in those spiritu- 
al principles whose general promulgation is so vital to the 
community. Hence there arose some who said among them- 
selves, if this gospel of Christ is so essential to be preached and 
supported, it is equally essential to be loved, received, obeyed. 
Its doctrines are not simply good for preaching. They are vital 
to a right living. They are the foundations of the city. They 
must be the foundations of our souls. 

And thus thinking, and moved by the heavenly impulse, they 
gathered themselves together and were formed into another 
society, — a society relying upon the divine aid and spirit; 
confessing and adoring the divine Redeemer, and aiming to car- 
ry out into daily life the vital doctrines and rules of Christ, and 
to discharge responsibilities and obligations they had theoreti- 
cally recognized as essential. They aimed to restore religion to 



16 



its throne in their hearts, and planted a church for its nurture, 
against which the gates of hell shall not prevail. They deemed 
that Christ was as necessary to the individual as to society, and 
that He should be admitted into their hearts and lives as a wel- 
come guest, as a life-giving Saviour, as a Supreme Ruler, and 
that His church was the great helper and bond of their spiritual 
obligations, and had clear claims upon their personal member- 
ship and service : that His church is the only organization for 
giving practical effect and triumphant power to the deepest truths 
of God's word ; and, therefore, urged by a conviction of duty 
and by the best motives of the divine spirit and word, they asked 
of the neighboring churches and ministers, to embody and or- 
ganize them into a church of Christ. Accordingly, on the 20th 
July, 1808, three months after the institution of the society, 
seventeen persons, — eight men, nine women, — were organized 
into a church of Christ.* Three of that number are still living 
and are present in this house to-day, and one of them was the 
first clerk of the new church. At the first communion thereaf- 
ter, twelve more persons were admitted to the church by pro- 
fession, and but one of that number is now living. 

The worship of the church was in the old Academy, and was 
conducted by Mr. Wright. On the fifth day of May, 1809, the 
youthful church received a letter from the church in Falmouth, 
Mass., expressing their congratulations, and in token of their 
love and fellowship, presenting a " set of vessels for the Holy 
Communion." At the same meeting the church voted to give a 
call to Mr. Wright. Before the ordination of Mr. Wright, 
which occurred on the 16th day of August, 1809, and on the day 
of his ordination, there were baptized fifteen children. Some of 
those children are before me. Some of them are in the heavens. 

The effects of the steps already taken in respects to the reli- 
gious interests of the village, were decided and permanent. It 
was soon demonstrated how much more effective and useful is a 

* See Appendix. 



17 



complete ecclesiastical organization, than any random individual 
or social activity. The little church, with its newly elected 
pastor, its regular services, and its scriptural ordinances, its 
doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread and prayers, became a 
power in this community. There was a life in it, not fitful nor 
spasmodic, but constant and divine, stedfast and earnest. There 
was one thing strongly in favor of the beneficial action of the 
church. The people had received but little religious instruction ; 
they were free from those inveterate sectarian prejudices and 
opinions, which always spring up in the pathway of ignorant or 
bigoted or denominational preachers. The preamble to their 
society rules, shows how completely they were inclined to merge 
all trifling differences, and come to worship together under one 
ministry. They were harmonious in their general religious 
views. They had had a specimen of the preaching of an errorist, 
and were satisfied with it. There was no hungering nor thirsting 
after fanciful doctrines, and sparkling religious theories. They 
needed some firm, consistent, elevating, divine system and truth, 
to stem the destructive tides, that were sweeping out their secu- 
rity, their morality and their respectability, and they wanted 
just what they needed. Their wishes run paralell with their 
necessities. They needed foundations for a christian city, and 
they had learned that all other foundations are vanity and vexa- 
tion, and they now were prepared generally to receive and build 
upon the chief corner stone — the Rock of Divine Truth. 

The first pastor of the church says of the state of religion at 
the time of the organization of the church and subsequently, 
" The public examination of the candidates for church member- 
ship, together with the solemn transaction of professing faith in 
the several articles of the religion of Christ, and entering into 
covenant with God and with each other, appeared to affect the 
minds of numbers, and several were soon after hopefully brought 
to embrace the Gospel. Here and there a solitary individual 
was powerfully wrought upon, and brought to tlic knowl- 



18 



edge and love of Jesus, and the church received additions at 
almost every communion till the time of my ordination.' ' Seve- 
ral were converted in the ensuing autumn, and united with the 
church some time in the winter. In the following spring, just 
as the face of nature was being renewed, and the eartli was burst- 
ing with the germs of flowers and fruit, and putting on her 
queenly robes, and preparing her annual tribute of praise to the 
Lord and Giver of her life, — the divine seed, which had been 
sown in the moral soil, began to germinate and reveal the power 
of that divine life which quickened and vivified it. On Sunday, 
the 27th of May, 1810, the assembly was larger than ever be- 
fore known on a like occasion, and remarkably attentive. The 
evening conference beheld the unusual sight of a thronged and 
crowded auditory. After the usual service of remarks, prayer 
and singing, a young man rose and wished to address the assem- 
bly. His emotions choked his utterance, and when at length he 
found voice to speak, lie informed them that he had given up his 
opposition to the truth, and had yielded to the divine influ- 
ence that drew him to the Savior. He confessed and mourned 
his sin. He was followed by a friend, who expressed himself in 
a similar manner. The effect of their appearance was wonder- 
ful. It struck the magnetic cord of religious sensibility till it vi- 
brated, so that while tears flowed from every heart, yet joy spar- 
kled in the brimming eyes of the friends of Zion, and their souls 
seemed to triumph in the faith of the divine blessing. Monday 
was still as the Sabbath. On Tuesday evening, at the church con- 
ference, eight or nine young men avowed themselves for Christ. 
The progress of the work was rapid, but without disorder or any 
wild excitement. The interest continued till September, when it 
gradually subsided, with some intervals of transient reawakening 
and some new instances of conversion. It was confined almost 
wholly to the village, consisting at that time of only sixty fami- 
lies, and the church was increased in the iirsttwo years of its ex- 
istence to the number of seventy. Very many of those who but 



19 



a little while before had united themselves to the society and 
signed that remarkable statement, declaring that the Gospel was 
essential to them as a community and as men, were led to yield 
their personal homage to the Redeemer, and in His church to try 
to apply the general doctrines they professed. The whole choir, 
then led by a venerable member of our present audience, all be- 
came members of the church, and it might have been said of the 
church then, as David sung of the ancient Zion, As well the 
singers as the players on instruments shall be there. 

In two short years, the testimony is universal, a great change 
passed over the society. The city which hath foundations, whose 
builder and maker is God, was beginning to rear its walls, and 
palaces, and temples, and to be inhabited with a divine glory. — 
In family after family, the worship of the true Jehovah was estab- 
lished, and morning and evening sacrifice was regularly offered 
in the name of Jesus. Men of unbelieving and sceptical senti- 
ments became impressed and sobered. Young men of dissipated 
habits became industrious and devout. The streets no longer 
echoed with ribaldry and profaneness ; social life and intercourse 
were greatly refined and improved. Generous charity, compre- 
hensive courtesy, true hospitality, gave a freshness, an amen- 
ity, a mutual interest and affection, a pure flavor and relish to so- 
cial exchanges and recreations never known before, and it seemed 
as if the placid and beneficent spirit of Christianity had descend- 
ed to hover over and to dwell in a place once so troubled and 
distracted. 

The influence of this interest still continued, or rather, and it 
seems the more proper and the more in harmony with the laws of 
the spiritual kingdom of Christ to say, the principles upon which 
the church was built, the principles of religion, which found 
expression in the organization of the society, attended and 
blessed by the Divine spirit, kept on working and producing their 
genuine and legitimate results. I love to think of those princi- 
ples, still operating, and acting with more or less urgency on the 



20 



minds of the people, as they awake to their consideration and as 
the church is faithful and earnest in their inculcation. The 
faithful ministrations of the pastor, and the prayers of the church , 
kept alive in the minds of men the lessons of divine truth. In 
the three years subsequent to 1812, over thirty persons united 
with the church ; and then again, from 1816 to 1820, the records 
would indicate a general seriousness and an honest consideration 
of religious duties. In that circle of four years, 142 persons were 
admitted to the fellowship of the church. At no time in the his- 
tory of Mr. Wright's ministry, was there any remarkable moral 
sterility. The influences of divine grace and truth were steady 
and effective. The special times of religious interest were not 
followed by drought and reaction. There were changes of tides, 
periods of its flood and years of its ebb ; but the history of the 
church was strictly in accordance with the ordinary course of 
spiritual laws. In 1826, Nov. 27, the Sunday School was estab- 
lished by vote of the church. In 1827 there was another spring- 
tide of divine influence and religious zeal and love, and more than 
seventy were led to the acknowledgement of their duties and re- 
lations to God. And again in 1830, there was a general relig- 
ious interest. The church was almost daily enlarging, and from 
a little band had come to be a great assembly of the professed dis- 
ciples of Christ. In December, 1831, occurred the dismission of 
Mr. Wright, after a laborious and successful ministry of twenty- 
one years, in which the church had grown from absolutely the 
least of all seeds, from almost or quite nothing, to be, and then to 
become a great tree, of wide-spreading branches, filled with fruit- 
age and blossoms, the fresh opening bud of religious experience, 
the full-blown flower of christian hope, and the strong, hardy, 
ripe, mellow fruit of a matured christian character and life. Du- 
ring the ministry of Mr. Wright, 428 persons were admitted to 
the church, an average of more than twenty per year, and of 
more than three at each communion. But the fruits of his 
ministry are not to be estimated by numbers, but only by the 



21 



moral measurements of eternity. Whatever controversies might 
have disturbed his peace or troubled the closing days of his min- 
istry among his people, yet never a tongue, in all the numberless 
allusions that I have heard made to him, has spoken aught but in 
respect of his character and admiration of his ministry. Even 
those who questioned the wisdom of his course, have never im- 
pugned the sincerity or the purity of his motives and his life. If 
the zeal of the Lord's house had eaten him up ; if he regarded the 
honor and peculiar sacredness of the Christian covenant and pro- 
fesssion, with a careful and ever watchful jealousy ; if the church 
was to him dearer than the apple of his eye ; if he felt that no 
earthly institution or order should usurp in men's thoughts or af- 
fections the place that was due only and altogether to the glori- 
ous city of his God : if he believed that she furnished an arena 
wide enough for the exercise of all human gifts and powers, and 
if he oppugned with warmth and ardor principles and systems. 
that he feared were subtracting from the crown of his master 
some of its lustre, and from the diadem of the church some of its 
prerogatives and titles, he certainly stands unimpeached before the 
tribunal of Heaven. It was the excellence, the purity, the power, 
the permanence of no trifling, or inferior, or unworthy object for 
which he was solicitous, and we wonder not that he who pre- 
ferred Jerusalem above his chief joy, he whose tongue would 
have forgotten its gifts, and whose hand would have lost its cun- 
ning, rather than the least injury or defacement should come to 
the loved object of his prayers and his toils, should view witli 
painful jealousy, and attack with a natural and generous impetu- 
osity, the apprehended evil. 

Mr. Wright was a warm-hearted, true-hearted man : frank 
and fearless, sincere and honest, transparent as the air, liberal 
and generous to a fault. As a preacher, he was surpassed by 
none in the State. As a pastor, it would be impossible to over- 
state his worth and excellence. To relieve necessity, to comfort 
sorrow, to assuage grief, to lift burdens from mens' shoulders 



22 



and cany them himself, was his delight. His benevolence and 
charity were singularly strong and massive virtues. He loved 
men with a warm, unselfish love. He loved to whisper words of 
Christ into the ears of the dying, and his noiseless footfall oft 
brought a living and abundant sympathy into the chambers of the 
sick and afflicted. No duties of his ministry were too lowly for 
his performance ; no sacrifices and self-denials too great to be 
made for the good of others. With all his zeal, he was a man 
of judgment. His counsel and advice were sought and esteemed. 
He was strict in doctrine, kind and decided in discipline, watch- 
ful and prayerful. Even to this day, the living power of his min- 
istry is seen and felt in all this community, and his memory is 
kept in the hearts of many, fresh and sacred — fragrant and per- 
fumed with the savor of a deep, deathless devotion to the cause 
of his Master. The church, nay, the village of Montpelier, is in- 
debted to him, under God, for many of those principles and sen- 
timents, and generous, hospitable, social traits, and kind brother- 
ly feelings, which have distinguished its society. Underneath all 
the frivolities and conventionalities of her modern life, there is 
a strong, blessed undercurrent of human sympathies, and effective 
feelings of social interest and life, which have their source in the 
influence of his ministry. His record of labor and love, of care 
and solicitude, of charity and devotion, of sympathetic ministra- 
tion, and faithful, earnest instruction, is above. But to-day we 
would not forget to speak of him who for nearly half the history 
of this church was its chosen pastor, whose heart was wrapped 
up in its welfare, and who now looks down from the glorified as- 
sembly of heaven, to share in our joys at the further triumph of 
those holy principles to which he consecrated his life, and whose 
ineffaceble virtue was attested in his ministry, and is proved in 
the sacred services of this occasion. 

In the course of the ministry of Mr. Weight, two events oc- 
curred, materially affecting the interests and prosperity of the 
church, that should be mentioned in passing. The society had 



been without any place of worship of its own until this edifice 
was built. It had occupied the Academy as a place of worship 
until 1810. and after that held its assemblies in the old State 
House, until 1820. Its present house of worship was completed 
during that year, and has been occupied ever since, with several 
revisions and changes, for the public service of the church. — 
And by a singular Providence, the State, to which the society was 
indebted for a place of worship for ten years of its early history, 
is now dependent upon the society for its house of General As- 
sembly. From the beginning, there seems to have been a practi- 
cal, external union between the State and this church, and a mu- 
tual dependence and interchange of hospitalities. The second 
event was the formation of the Methodist church in this village. 
By a wise construction of human nature, and a kind arrangement 
of Providence, it is impossible that all men should see, and feel, 
and think alike, in regard to external forms and organizations 
and policies. Agreeing in the essentials of religion, it is a nec- 
essity of nature that they should differ in non-essentials. The 
forest must have its various trees, whose diversified figures and 
size and color and foliage and fruit and flowering make up the 
singular beauty and glory of natural scenery. So the church 
must have its differences of worship and forms, a divine unity in 
connexion with an endless variety. Thus it addresses men of all 
es and of every degree of culture and position. For the gen- 
eral interests of religion, and for the particular advantage and 
prosperity of this church, nothing could have been more favora- 
ble than the organization of the church of another denomination 
in this village. The whole field had become too large t<» be 
reached by one class of laborers. It needed, then, that others, 
differing from us only in name and methods, should enter into it, 
to -peak to a mass of hearers that we could not reach, and to 
subserve the cause of Christ in quarters that were beyond our in- 
fluence. Whatever small and contemptible jealousies might at 
times spring up in the operation of the different churches, would 



24 



necessarily all disappear under the reflection of an intelligent 
judgment. The churches of various denominations can work 
together, for the same ends, with less of rivalry than those of the 
same denomination, and it is a far happier thing for the interests 
of religion that the one universal church has its distinct and 
various branches and forms of discipline, than if it was given 
over to the inaction, to the dead level, or to the terrible bigotry 
and despotism of a dull and dreary uniformity. 

After an interval of nine months, the church was supplied with 
another pastor. Mr. Hopkins occupied the pulpit but three 
years and a half, when his resignation was rendered advisable by 
the state of his health. Near the close of his ministry, a new 
Congregational church was formed by members of this church, 
dismissed with reference to that object. In the course of his la- 
bors here, forty-eight persons were received into the church. It 
has been stated that his dismission from the society was caused 
in part by his apprehension of the effect of the new measure 
movement, to which at that time the church seemed disposed to 
commit itself. Be that as it may, I find from the records that 
immediately upon his leaving, the Rev. Mr. Burchaed, a noted 
revivalist, was invited to hold one of his protracted meetings in 
this church. For more than forty days he labored in this village, 
and doubtless with many good results. Still it is apparent that 
the good was accomplished only at a tremendous cost. The reg- 
ular services of the church, and the regular duties and labors of 
life, were broken up, in and some cases dispensed with altogether. 
Business was in a great degree suspended. The wildest excite- 
ment and extravagance took the place of sobriety of deportment 
and calm, intelligent reflection and action. Mens' minds and 
hearts were stimulated with unhealthful motives, were urged to 
avowals they were not prepared to make ; and religion, a quiet, 
beautiful spirit of faith and love, and of faith working by love, 
was transmuted into the passion of an hour or the spasm of a day. 
Unintentionally, the holiest things were travestied— false ideas of 



25 



conversion, as if it were some mystical, magical change, and of a 
religions life, as if it were a momentary fever, or the sudden 
thrill of sensibility, were inculcated. The mystery of divine in- 
fluence and operation was parodied. The doors of the church 
were swung wide open, and while the fever was on, in the space 
of a short month and a half, more than a hundred and twenty-live 
professed their faith in Christ. It is such scenes, my brethren, 
in which men attempt to do the work of God, that are most fatal 
to the virtue, and faith, and the activity of the church. And had 
it not been for the strong undercurrent of religious principle, 
flowing down from the fountain head of the church, and identifi- 
ed with its history and its former ministry, such a passionate 
excitement, such a galvanized, spasmodic action, must have 
proved fearfully injurious, if not destructive. But a city 
which had foundations, however shaken it might be by such a 
moral earthquake, was not doomed to be destroyed. It had re- 
cuperative power, and when the flaming words, the spiritual 
stimulants, the external passion, ceased to be felt, the church 
gathered itself from its reaction of excitement, took home the 
lessons of an instructive experience, and set itself to the work of 
discipline and correction. 

Of course after the departure of such an exciting preacher, the 
church would find it difficult to settle down lo tiie regular minis- 
trations of the divine word, or to find a pastor who would unite 
their suffrages. For a year, thereafter, the society was afflicted 
with seventeen candidates, a number sufficient to have furnished a 
half dozen. superior ministers. At length a call was given to Mr. 
J>. W. Smith, and accepted. lie labored to the general satisfac- 
tion, but under very great disadvantages from ill health, lor four 
years, when he resigned his pastorate. During his ministry 
eighty-two persons were admitted to the church. 

In a few months after his disunion, Mr. Gridlet? was installed 
as pastor, and continued in that responsible relation five ye 
The admissions to the church while he was here were forty-six. 

I 



26 



The only event during Ms ministry of peculiar importance was 
the dismissal of several of the members of the church to the 
Protestant Episcopal Church, including one who was for a long 
time a faithful and efficient co-laborer with us, a superintendent 
of the Sunday School, and the not infrequent lay reader of ser- 
mons to this congregation ; a gentleman of education and piety, 
who became the first rector of that church in this village. It is 
not inappropriate to say that while we greet the success and pros- 
perity of that society, and rejoice in its present healthful activity 
and enlargement, and recognize it, in its method and ways, as an 
efficient agent of Christ's Kingdom, we yet take peculiar satis- 
faction and pleasure in the remembrance that many of the prin- 
ciples and persons, which have given to it such animation and ef- 
ficiency, were begotten and nurtured under the shadow of these 
walls. And it is almost with a maternal sentiment that we con- 
template its origin, while witli fraternal salutation we bid it to- 
day God speed in the work in which we are united, of raising 
this whole community to the level of the Gospel, to the principles 
of Christ, to the Kingdom of the blessed Redeemer. Diverse in 
form, the churches of this place are now constituted so as to ad- 
dress all shades of natural taste, and being one in spirit and in 
object, may yet tenfold their numbers and influence and become 
permanent radiating centres of living light, far and wide. It is 
their own fault if any mutual jealousy fetters their limbs and pre- 
vents the occupancy of their sufficient and wonderful heritage. 
The field is white to the harvest, and the Lord of the harvest 
bids us all work for a common and sacred end. 

I have already, on a former occasion, adverted to the records 
of my own ministry among you ; yet still, the occasion would 
seem to require some notice of its events. I came here in a time 
of division and controversy. With the dreams of youth and in- 
experience, I entered upon the hard toil of the ministry, in a dis- 
united church, divided not in principle, not in vital sentiment, 
but in local policy and about persons. The records of the church 



/ 



\ 



27 



from that day to this are not mere statistics and notes and cata- 
logues to me, but a life, a labor, a struggle, full of fears and ap- 
prehensions, and encouragements, and joys, and hopes. On these 
things one might naturally be garrulous ; . but I forbear entirely. 
1 will only say that God has blessed an unworthy and feeble min- 
istry, and thank Him for the vast mercies that have followed the 
course of our relationship. The short period of eleven years has 
been filled with changes. I preach in the same house, but not to 
the same audience that listened to my first sermon. Eighty re- 
movals and sixty-three deaths in the society ; seventy dismissions 
from the church and forty-three deaths in it — making a total of 
two hundred and fifty changes since I began my work with you, — 
have changed this church and society one-half. But yet while 
we arc daily losing, we arc also daily gaining. There have been 
one hundred and sixty-six admissions to the church — making a 
net gain of fifty-six, and a considerable increase in the societv. 
There have been eighty baptisms. The church is now in an effi- 
cient state of organized action — its moral sentiments healthful, 
its spirift of consecration and devotion revived. God has caused 
His face to shine upon us and blessed us, and there is no reason 
why the principles announced at the birth of the society and in- 
corporated into its vital religious action, should not more thor- 
oughly leaven and pervade the whole community. We have now. 
in the religious interest which pervades the church, a specimen of 
the divine power she should have and exert the whole time. We 
work, and pray and wait, for larger accessions to the true church 
and fold of the Redeemer — for those who were long ago baptized 
at its altars — for those who for scores of years, through fair 
weather and foul, have stuck by the society, and ever put their 
shoulders to the wheel, never forgetful of the great principles of 
the Gospel, but as yet not submitting to its personal claims. — 
This church can now give her invitations with more earnestness 
and force than ever before. She has a history of fifty years. — 
She has tested the virtue of her everlasting foundations. She 



has a roll of 924 members, of whom 364 are to-day in her earth- 
ly communion, and nearly 300 gone home to that happy harbor of 
God's saints, 

" Whose gardens and -whose goodly walks 
" Continually are green." 

And when we urge upon men the practical avowal of those 
principles they so cheerfully acknowledge and heartily sustain, 
our entreaty is enforced by a great cloud of witnesses ; by the 
voices of the living and the dead : by the united voice of a large 
and illustrious throng of near a thousand members. We ask 
them to enter and become residents of a city which hath founda- 
tions, proved to be solid and safe by the experience of the best 
and wisest, by the facts of Providence, by the passage of gener- 
tions, by the testimony of history, events, persons. We stand 
upon high ground, upon the rock of immutable truth, upon the 
foundation of imperishable principle, upon a platform on which 
have been planted the feet of myriads of the saintliest men, 
upon the deep convictions of human want and instinctive aspira- 
tion ; and while we point to the records of the past, as evidence 
of the power and necessity of religion, we point you to the fu- 
ture as the alone scene of its joys and victories. If the church 
in the future be only faithful to its own history and its own 
principles, it shall yet give practical efficiency and triumphant 
"success to the sacred lessons of Divine Truth. It shall be an 
organization that shall teach to coming generations, that the 
life is more than meat ; that the soul is too precious to be bar- 
tered for the world. It should set wide open to all true peni- 
tents and seekers after life and immortality, the gates of that 
city whose foundations are builded and made by God. It shall 
be the means for unfolding and nourishing our capacities for 
morality and piety. It shall be the nursery of all goodness, 
the school of the purest graces, the temple for prayer and praise, 
the holy mountain of which glorious things will be spoken. 



29 



The time has come and now is, when this community perceive 
that we are just as distinctly required to recognize, love and 
obey and worship God, as to supply our physical necessities, as 
to improve our minds or cherish our social relations. This fun- 
damental principle was incorporated into the very constitution 
of this society, when it declared in its organic article, that re- 
ligion was essential to public interests and to individual men. 
The time is coming, we already forsee and greet its approaching 
dawn, when Christ's church, which is the great school and aid 
of our spiritual obligations, will have its claims on the personal 
respect and membership admitted by each one of you ; when in a 
community like ours, receiving the dowry and heritage of chris- 
tian principles and ideas, from the experience of the past, and 
from the teachings of the gospel and the Holy Spirit, a man or a 
woman standing aloof from the thorough and consistent practice 
of christian virtue and piety, ought to be and will be just as sin- 
gular and anomalous and reprehensible as a person that should 
refuse to cultivate his mind, or to get food for his hunger, or to 
love his kindred and benefactors. 

I should have been glad to have gathered and collected the 
floating remembrances of our old men, of the times and history 
I have so rapidly passed over. Even now I can seem to sec the 
strife that has marked some portions of the course of the church. 
But I always turn with grief and humility from records of conflict 
among christian brethren. The clangor of warfare and heated 
passion ought never to waken among the sacred echoes of the 
sanctuary. I would turn from these occasional scenes, not 
proof indeed of the falsity of our religion or our professions, but 
evidence of our mortal weakness and passion, to other visions 
and memories, more constant, more beautiful. The celestial 
spirit of peace has never long been absent from this society. 
The failures of christians, the inconsistencies of false brethren, 
are the exceptions in the course of the church : joy and peace 
have been the rule. I seem to hear the voice of her many choirs, 



30 



all blending this day in grand unison to the glory of God. I 
seem to catch some strains of the strange melody of all her 
singers and instruments of music. I listen to the solemn dirge 
for her dead, the sober grief of her funeral orations, the sobs of 
her mourners, the songs of her redeemed. Again, in long circles 
of young men and maidens, ot strong men and furrowed age, her 
thousand witnesses for Christ seem to collect and stand before 
her altar and repeat her solemn consecration and sit around 
the hallowed emblems of her Saviour's death. Again, I hear 
their concluding triumphant acclaim, the sublime doxology to 
the Triune Jehovah,' not one voice wanting in that imagined 
song. Again, I seem to hear the words of prayer and invita- 
tion, and the voices long or lately hushed in death, that used to 
break the stillness of her conference. 

And as the imagination goes into the past, to awake into 
life its history, and to kindle its scenes, so does it project itself 
onward, fifty, an hundred years. Then another voice than mine 
shall address another audience than this, on the centennial birth- 
day of the church. Two or three that joined it at the last 
communion may hear the discourse. The rest shall have fallen 
asleep. Another organ shall respond to the fingers of another 
player ; another choir shall chant the same sublime psalm and 
hymns ; these places left of us shall be filled with many more. 
Eternity will be our residence. Glorious things will still be 
spoken of Thee, City of oub God ! when we who have not 
only built its temples, but entered into its blood-bought throng, 
shall be joining the seven-fold chorus of hallelujahs sung by an- 
gels and the redeemed before the Throne of God ! 

My Brethren, my Friends, my Associates, my Hearers, mffl 
its centennial cycle find us all, if removed from earth, in that 
City which hath foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God. 

" Thy Avails are built of precious stones, 
" Thy bulwarks, diamond square, 
" Thy gates are all of orient pearl, 
" God, if I were there ! 



31 



«' Thy gardens and thy goodly walks, 

" Continually are green, 

" Where grow such sweet and pleasant flowers, 

" As nowhere else are seen. 

" Right through thy streets with pleasing sound, 

" The flood of life doth flow, 

" And on the banks on either side, 

" The trees of life do grow. 

" Those trees each month grow ripened fruit, 

" Forever more they spring, 

" And all the nations of the earth 

" To Thee their honors bring. 

" O ! my sweet home, Jerusalem ! 
" When shall I come to thee, 
" When shall my sorrows have an end, 
"Thy joys when shall I see !" 



APPENDIX, 



AGREEMENT OF THE MEMBERS OF THE FIRST CONGREGATIONAL 
SOCIETY OF MONTPELIER. 

Impressed with the importance of religious institutions to society in general, and to 
ourselves as men, and taking into consideration the unsettled state of such institutions 
in this part of the country, and the necessity of uniting in religious opinions and har- 
mony : we do hereby agree and form ourselves into a religious society, by the name of 
the first Congregational Society in Montpelier, under the following regulations : 

1. We pledge ourselves to each other that we will (laying aside all trifling differen- 
ces) according to our abilities, maintain regular meetings in our Society, and contrib- 
ute to the support of preaching, and when consistent, to maintaining a regular cler- 
gyman in the Society. 

2. That no member of this Society shall be compelled to pay any sum or sums for 
the use of the Society, except such sum as he shall voluntarily subscribe. 

3. When any member of the society shall remove to such distance as to render it 
inconvenient, for him to attend our meetings, or shall in conscience think he ought to 



32 



dissent, he may notify the Clerk thereof, whose duty it shall be to enter the same on 
record, and such person shall no longer be considered as a member of this Society. 

4. We agree to meet at the usual place of holding meetings, in the Academy in 
Montpelier, on Wednesday, the 27th day of April, instant, at three o'clock in the af- 
ternoon, for the purpose of organizing said society with proper officers, and transact- 
ing any proper business when met. 

Dated at Montpelier, this 12th day of April, 1809. 



ElishaTown, 
George Worthington, 
Joseph Hutchins, 
G. B. R. Gove, 
Oliver Goss, 
Thomas Davis, 
Timothy Hubbard, 
John Bates, 
Charles Bulkley, 
Augustus Bradford, 
John Hurlbut, 
Alden Clark, 
Isaac Freeman, 
Amasa Brown, 
Jeduthan Loomis, 
Stuart Boyntom, 
Willis I. Cadwell, 
Abel Wilson, 
Phineas Woodbury, 
Thomas Reed, 
Sylvester Day, 
Nathan Jewett, 
E. D. Persons, 
Samuel Prentiss, jun. 
Urial H. Orvis, 
Ellis Nye, 
Joseph Howes, 



Linus Ellis, 
William Hutchins, 
Jeremiah Wilbur, 
Boswell Beckwith, 
David Tuthill, 
M. B. Billings, 
Jonathan Shepherd, 
Erastus Watrous, 
■ Silas Burbank, 
> Cyrus Ware, 
* Roger Hubbard, 
Joseph Freeman, 
- Edward Lamb, 
Nahum Kelton, 
"Larn'd Lamb, 
' C. W. Houghton, 
Josiah Parks, 
Sylvanus Baldwin. 
'Joseph Wiggins, 
Abner H. Powers, 
Abel Crooker, 
Ebenezer Morse, 
Enoch Cheney, 
Mason Johnson, 
Samuel Goss, 
David Edwards, 
Eelisha Town- 
Oliver Dewey, 



John Hunt, 
Ichabod Peck, 
Darius Boyden, 
Levi Pitkin 
E. Lewis, 
Hers. Estabrooks, 
T. Gaylord, 
Jude Converse, 
Theoph. Pickering. 
Archibald Kidd. 
Joseph Ray, 
Paul Knapp, 
Henry Howes, 
Samnel West, 
D. Edwards, jun., 
Jonathan Edwards, 
Aaron Bass, 
Charles Hamlin, 
William Hamlin, 
Timothy Hatch, 
Solomon Lewis, 
Elijah Tyler, 
John Howes, 
Joshua Y. Vail, 
J. H. Langdon, 
S. W. Cobb, 
Eben'r Parker. 



NAMES OF THE ORIGINAL MEMBERS OF THE CHURCH. 



Amasa Brown, 
Sylvanus Baldwin, 
Andrew Dodge, 
Heraldus Estabrooks, 
Samuel Goss, 
Timothy Hatch, 



Joseph Howes, 
Solomon Lewis, 

Sibyl Brown, 
Bachsheba Burbank, 
Lydia Davis, 



Susanna Lewis, 
Lydia Hatch, 
Polly Barker, 
Patty Howes, 
Rebeckah Persons 
Sarah Wiggins. 



PASTORS. 



Rev. Chester Wright, ordained Aug. 16, 1809; dismissed Dec. 22, 1830. 
Rev. Samuel Hopkins, ordained Oct. 26, 1831 ; dismissed April 19, 183-1 
Rev. Buel W. Smith, ordained Aug. 25, 1836 ; dismissed July 15, 1840. 
Rev. John Gridley, installed Dec. 15, 1841 ; dismissed Dec. '9, 1846. 
Rev. Wm. H. Lord, ordainod Sept. 21, 1847. 



MEMBERS. 



Number of members at the organization. 
Admitted under Rev. Mr. Wright, 
"' " Rev. Mr. Hopkins, . 

" " stated supply, 

*• " Rev. Mr. Smith, 

" " Rev. Mr. Gridley, 

" " Rev. Mr. Lord, 



17 
428 

48 
137 

82 

46 
166 



924 



-%^^^^^^^h^^4^f^ 



A. SEEMON 

OX OCCASION OF THE 

«» FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY 

OF THE ORGANIZATION OF THE 

FIEST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH 

IN M N T P E LI E R , VERMONT. 
By W.H. LORD, Past on. 






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